With more money than poll support, O’Rourke sharpens campaign against Cruz

U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, faces U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-El Paso, in debate at the KENS 5 Studios in San Antonio on October 16, 2018.

Photo: Tom Reel, Staff / Staff photographer

WASHINGTON — Up in the money chase, but down in the polls with two weeks to go, El Paso Democratic U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke has taken an assertive turn in his underdog challenge to Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz.

Hit by a succession of Cruz attack ads — likely to be amplified by President Donald Trump’s rally Monday night in Houston — O’Rourke is fighting back with direct challenges to the Republican’s honesty.

Nowhere was it more evident than in their final debate Tuesday in San Antonio, when O’Rourke resurrected Trump’s “Lyin’ Ted” moniker from the 2016 Republican presidential primaries.

O’Rourke acknowledged two days later that taking a page from Trump’s playbook made him uncomfortable, even if he felt he was responding to misleading Cruz attacks suggesting that he wants to legalize heroin, take away people’s guns, or “open” the border.

“Perhaps, in the heat of the moment, I took a step too far,” O’Rourke said in a CNN town hall Thursday night in McAllen. “I don’t know that that’s the way I want to be talking in this campaign.”

But he also rolled out a series of television ads in the last week criticizing Cruz directly on education, health care and immigration, chastising his opponent for “selling paranoia and fear instead of solutions.”

O’Rourke’s new edge in the closing weeks of the race is a departure from the generally positive tone of his 18-month campaign, in which he has spoken little about Cruz, eschewed partisanship and appealed to voters’ hopes.

Many Republicans chalk it up to desperation.

“He’s taking it straight out of the Trump playbook, and the only problem is he’s not Trump,” said Texas fundraiser Mica Mosbacher, a Trump 2020 advisor and former Cruz co-chair for women.

Cruz accused O’Rourke of having “unleashed the dogs,” suggesting “their pollsters have told them they’re in trouble, and so the decision they’ve made is attack and go ugly and nasty.”

O’Rourke maintains his campaign does not use pollsters. Regardless, some Democrats say a more forceful line was always to be expected.

“I never expected anything different,” said Texas Democratic strategist Matt Angle. “If there was any kind of miscalculation within the campaign it was that somebody might have thought you wouldn’t challenge your opponent straight up.”

Political analysts say it is simply a sign that Election Day is drawing near, and that time is running out. In any campaign against a sitting senator, the conventional wisdom holds that it is up to the challenger to make the case that voters should fire the incumbent. Until now, that case has largely been made by outside groups such as the Fire Ted Cruz PAC, a group run by Dallas lawyer and Democratic donor Marc Stanley.

“We need to shake things up,” Stanley said in a recent fundraising pitch to supporters. “We need someone out there telling the truth about Ted Cruz.”

Tough-guy image

One web ad that went viral was produced by Texas native and “Boyhood” director Richard Linklater questioning Cruz’s Texas “toughness” over Trump’s insults to Cruz’s family during the 2016 GOP primaries.

O’Rourke’s ads, in contrast, have until recently featured soaring soundbites and extended montages of his travels around the state, emphasizing his willingness to “show up” in all 254 Texas counties — a fairly mild reminder of Cruz’s 99-county tour of Iowa during his 2016 White House bid.

Democratic consultants also believe that Cruz, known better for his partisan fervor than congeniality, provides a ready target for a more hard-edged approach.

“Nobody plays the role of the bad guy in a drama better than Ted Cruz,” Angle said.

Republicans say Cruz can stand on his conservative credentials alone.

“I used to say he may not be everyone’s favorite drinking partner, but he is Texans’ favorite designated driver,” Mosbacher said.

For O’Rourke, who has sworn to elevate his campaign above the meanness of modern politics, a more confrontational style is not without risk, undermining an upbeat, sunny disposition he has cultivated on the campaign trail.

“It clearly is a sign of desperation,” said Texas Republican Party Chairman James Dickey, who believes O’Rourke’s policy agenda is too liberal for the state.

Some Democrats say that with partisan divisions hardening in the race, and few undecided voters left to persuade, O’Rourke needs to super-charge his campaign by putting his differences with Cruz into sharper contrast.

“He’s doing exactly what he needs to do,” said Democratic strategist Harold Cook, former executive director of the Texas Democratic Party. “If there is room to get into the lead in this race, I think that’s the way he does it.”

O’Rourke’s new ads, however critical of Cruz, still emphasize policy differences, not personal attacks. There is none of the eerie music or grainy black-and-white imagery that is the hallmark of negative political advertising.

Spare in their creative content, they consist simply of O’Rourke speaking directly into a camera, criticizing Cruz’s positions in favor of school vouchers, building a border wall, and deporting Dreamers. One also recounts Cruz’s efforts to repeal “every word” of the Affordable Care Act, which Democrats say would jettison current protections for people with pre-existing conditions.

“He has to be who he is,” Cook said of O’Rourke. “He can’t just be this other guy who attacks Cruz. I don’t think that’s what’s happened. You’ve got to walk and chew gum at the same time here.”

Either way, with Trump scheduled to rally the Republican faithful Monday night at the Toyota Center in Houston, strategists on both sides expect the race — and the rhetoric — to heat up in the coming two weeks.

Trump talk

Trump rallies in other states, like one he held Thursday in Montana, have tended to inflame passions. In a preview of an attack line he might make on O’Rourke, Trump accused Democrats — without evidence — of backing a “caravan” of Central American migrants who are traveling north to the U.S. border because they “figure everybody coming in is going to vote Democrat.”

Trump also went after O’Rourke on Twitter Friday afternoon.

“Beto O’Rourke is a total lightweight compared to Ted Cruz, and he comes nowhere near representing the values and desires of the people of the Great State of Texas. He will never be allowed to turn Texas into Venezuela!”

But political experts say incendiary formulations like that can mobilize both sides, raising questions about why Cruz, as the front-runner, would want to shake up the race at this late juncture.

“It’s an insurance policy,” Mosbacher said. The rally is a sign of due diligence, Republicans say, a way to mobilize their base.

Polls show that Trump’s approval rating in Texas is basically a wash between those who approve and disapprove.

With scarcely two weeks left in the race, O’Rourke said their differences can only become more stark.

“I want to make sure there’s a contrast offered on everything that we want to do, from immigration to education to health care,” O’Rourke said in McAllen. “The choice could not be any more clear.”

Kevin Diaz came to the Houston Chronicle in February 2014 with more than a decade of experience covering Washington. Before that, he was the chief Washington correspondent for the Minneapolis Star Tribune, where he got his start in journalism in 1984 as a night cops reporter. During his tenure in Minneapolis, he won awards for his coverage of gang crime and city hall. He also taught public affairs reporting at the University of Minnesota, where he received his Master’s. After a stint at the Washington (D.C.) City Paper, Kevin went back to the Star Tribune, where he won national awards for articles on globalization and immigration. He also covered the 9/11 terrorist attacks from Washington and New York. Born and raised in Italy, Kevin has reported from Italy, Brazil, Mexico, and Cuba, where he covered Jesse Ventura’s 2002 trade mission. In 2003, he filed daily Iraq War dispatches for McClatchy Newspapers from the U.S. Central Command in Qatar. In 2006, he covered the presidential election standoff in Mexico. He also has covered Washington for the Anchorage Daily News and the Idaho Statesman.